Output - Introducing PORTAL: A Granular FX Plugin
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
I am not familiar with Output. Are they known for doing sales sometimes?
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- KVRAF
- 2288 posts since 21 Mar, 2012 from Nom..nom.. YOUR MOM
Meh, occasionally.
Win 10 | Ableton Live 11 Suite | Reason 12 | i7 3770 @ 3.5 Ghz | 16 GB RAM | RME Babyface Pro| Akai MPC Live II & Akai Force | Roland System 8 | Roland TR-8 with 7x7 Expansion | Roland TB-3 | Roland MX-1 | Dreadbox Typhon | Korg Minilogue XD
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
Thanks! I think I will be patient...
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- KVRian
- 1134 posts since 4 May, 2008 from West London Depot
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- KVRAF
- 9813 posts since 18 Aug, 2007 from NYC
Well, after all the celebrity endorsements filling my email, I caved and purchased.
Just kidding, but I did purchase it via the bundle upgrade (3 expansions + Portal for $133).
My initial impression are that this things is surprisingly good! They did a great job of including useful features for modulation and obviously the giant X/Y pad lets us all know its meant to be performed. It is very smooth in using the X/Y pad.
I already have a decent number of granular tools, with most of them either having been built in Max, or Max 4 Live, or Reaktor. This one is a major step up in ease of use (for me) and please note, that I don't have Crusher-X and I won't be getting it so I obviously can't compare to that, but I love having a quickly accessible granular effect tool that can easily produce musical results... emphasis on easy.
I've had this for maybe 8 hours now, so lets see how this goes once the honeymoon phase wears off, but for now I'm very impressed.
Still, its too bad that they don't have a demo. If they had a demo, maybe they wouldn't need to flood email inboxes with celebrity endorsements.
Something like this is actually pretty difficult to watch others use because chances are good that someone else is using content you wouldn't choose and possibly using it in a context you wouldn't use either. Granular tends to have that signature "noise/developed as a school project" sound, and seeing how this might be different, requires a bit of hands-on usage. So yeah... demos would be nice.
Just kidding, but I did purchase it via the bundle upgrade (3 expansions + Portal for $133).
My initial impression are that this things is surprisingly good! They did a great job of including useful features for modulation and obviously the giant X/Y pad lets us all know its meant to be performed. It is very smooth in using the X/Y pad.
I already have a decent number of granular tools, with most of them either having been built in Max, or Max 4 Live, or Reaktor. This one is a major step up in ease of use (for me) and please note, that I don't have Crusher-X and I won't be getting it so I obviously can't compare to that, but I love having a quickly accessible granular effect tool that can easily produce musical results... emphasis on easy.
I've had this for maybe 8 hours now, so lets see how this goes once the honeymoon phase wears off, but for now I'm very impressed.
Still, its too bad that they don't have a demo. If they had a demo, maybe they wouldn't need to flood email inboxes with celebrity endorsements.
Something like this is actually pretty difficult to watch others use because chances are good that someone else is using content you wouldn't choose and possibly using it in a context you wouldn't use either. Granular tends to have that signature "noise/developed as a school project" sound, and seeing how this might be different, requires a bit of hands-on usage. So yeah... demos would be nice.
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
Thanks a lot for your input & feedback! Genuine reviews for 'real' users are actually still hard to find. Your is appreciated quit very welcomeelxsound wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 2:50 pm Well, after all the celebrity endorsements filling my email, I caved and purchased.
Just kidding, but I did purchase it via the bundle upgrade (3 expansions + Portal for $133).
My initial impression are that this things is surprisingly good! They did a great job of including useful features for modulation and obviously the giant X/Y pad lets us all know its meant to be performed. It is very smooth in using the X/Y pad.
I already have a decent number of granular tools, with most of them either having been built in Max, or Max 4 Live, or Reaktor. This one is a major step up in ease of use (for me) and please note, that I don't have Crusher-X and I won't be getting it so I obviously can't compare to that, but I love having a quickly accessible granular effect tool that can easily produce musical results... emphasis on easy.
I've had this for maybe 8 hours now, so lets see how this goes once the honeymoon phase wears off, but for now I'm very impressed.
Still, its too bad that they don't have a demo. If they had a demo, maybe they wouldn't need to flood email inboxes with celebrity endorsements.
Something like this is actually pretty difficult to watch others use because chances are good that someone else is using content you wouldn't choose and possibly using it in a context you wouldn't use either. Granular tends to have that signature "noise/developed as a school project" sound, and seeing how this might be different, requires a bit of hands-on usage. So yeah... demos would be nice.
Now appart from the workflow that obviously seems smooth and quite good & fun to use, just in term of pure sonic quality how do you like the granular sound engine? The granular process sounds good and pristine? Is it possible to create massive grain clouds that sound mellow and smooth, no too clicky or too ruff?
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- KVRAF
- 9813 posts since 18 Aug, 2007 from NYC
Not quite a review so far...
But no, not clicky at all... This is one of the biggest differences between many of the free granular tools out there. They really put in time to make the resulting sounds playable.
You can still get jittery sounds of course, but its easy to get smooth, elongated (slowed down) effects without all the extra "clicky" stuff.
Mellow, smooth grain clouds can be safely checked off here. There are presets there for that, so extremely easy.
But no, not clicky at all... This is one of the biggest differences between many of the free granular tools out there. They really put in time to make the resulting sounds playable.
You can still get jittery sounds of course, but its easy to get smooth, elongated (slowed down) effects without all the extra "clicky" stuff.
Mellow, smooth grain clouds can be safely checked off here. There are presets there for that, so extremely easy.
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
Again,elxsound wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 8:31 pm Not quite a review so far...
But no, not clicky at all... This is one of the biggest differences between many of the free granular tools out there. They really put in time to make the resulting sounds playable.
You can still get jittery sounds of course, but its easy to get smooth, elongated (slowed down) effects without all the extra "clicky" stuff.
Mellow, smooth grain clouds can be safely checked off here. There are presets there for that, so extremely easy.
thank you for your first impressions! Very tempting...
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- KVRist
- 469 posts since 21 May, 2016
Dude I joined their mailing list when Portal came out, thinking screw it, I'll check in if they ever have a sale.elxsound wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 2:50 pm Well, after all the celebrity endorsements filling my email, I caved and purchased.
Just kidding, but I did purchase it via the bundle upgrade (3 expansions + Portal for $133).
My initial impression are that this things is surprisingly good! They did a great job of including useful features for modulation and obviously the giant X/Y pad lets us all know its meant to be performed. It is very smooth in using the X/Y pad.
I already have a decent number of granular tools, with most of them either having been built in Max, or Max 4 Live, or Reaktor. This one is a major step up in ease of use (for me) and please note, that I don't have Crusher-X and I won't be getting it so I obviously can't compare to that, but I love having a quickly accessible granular effect tool that can easily produce musical results... emphasis on easy.
I've had this for maybe 8 hours now, so lets see how this goes once the honeymoon phase wears off, but for now I'm very impressed.
Still, its too bad that they don't have a demo. If they had a demo, maybe they wouldn't need to flood email inboxes with celebrity endorsements.
Something like this is actually pretty difficult to watch others use because chances are good that someone else is using content you wouldn't choose and possibly using it in a context you wouldn't use either. Granular tends to have that signature "noise/developed as a school project" sound, and seeing how this might be different, requires a bit of hands-on usage. So yeah... demos would be nice.
They sent me 3 emails in one day, and maybe it's my browser or something but their "email preferences" page to unsub from the mailing list doesn't have a submit/save changes button. I had to block their e-mail address. Nice work, Output
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
Meh srew it, I told myself last weekend: I’m gonna dive and give that grainy bad boy a try. And if I don’t like it like Output mentioned, I’ll just ask them for a refund
Maaaan I’m so glad I did! So here’s another quick user review from the few hours I spent with it so far. I have to say to my surprise that it’s really a little magic granular plugin. Really fun to use and very easy to warp your head around. I’d say that a good portion of the quality & the fun of this plugin is coming from the workflow indeed. Very intuitive and in a matter of minutes you already know how to assign and modulate everything. It very easy to make it sound organic and alive, especially with that X-Y circle which you can assign any parameters you want. Things get crazy & ultra creative when you start assign many parameters to the same axis.
The other thing that I didn’t see mentioned often apart from the granular processing is all the other effects implemented into Portal, that you can mix and merge as well into the granulation and modulation process, like phaser, bit crusher, filters, grain delay, reverb. Blended all together with the granular synthesis, it makes Portal quite a solid sonic monster. It’s definitely much more that just another granulator, it’s more like an multi-effect plugin with granular synthesis at the center of the whole thing. It reminds me a bit of Byome, but with more emphasis on granular synthesis.
I own a bunch granular tools with the almighty Crusher-X as well but still, I can find a unique place for Portal into my workflow. Might even become a secret sauce plugin for sound design and special experimental oriented sounds.
So finally, I won’t ask for a refund!
Maaaan I’m so glad I did! So here’s another quick user review from the few hours I spent with it so far. I have to say to my surprise that it’s really a little magic granular plugin. Really fun to use and very easy to warp your head around. I’d say that a good portion of the quality & the fun of this plugin is coming from the workflow indeed. Very intuitive and in a matter of minutes you already know how to assign and modulate everything. It very easy to make it sound organic and alive, especially with that X-Y circle which you can assign any parameters you want. Things get crazy & ultra creative when you start assign many parameters to the same axis.
The other thing that I didn’t see mentioned often apart from the granular processing is all the other effects implemented into Portal, that you can mix and merge as well into the granulation and modulation process, like phaser, bit crusher, filters, grain delay, reverb. Blended all together with the granular synthesis, it makes Portal quite a solid sonic monster. It’s definitely much more that just another granulator, it’s more like an multi-effect plugin with granular synthesis at the center of the whole thing. It reminds me a bit of Byome, but with more emphasis on granular synthesis.
I own a bunch granular tools with the almighty Crusher-X as well but still, I can find a unique place for Portal into my workflow. Might even become a secret sauce plugin for sound design and special experimental oriented sounds.
So finally, I won’t ask for a refund!
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- KVRAF
- 9813 posts since 18 Aug, 2007 from NYC
Nice one Neon Breath!
My one complaint so far is that the visual cue for modulations assignments is not consistent. They have this stupid “diamond box” for some, while others display a more useful ring.
To make it more confusing as to why they choose this, when you assign those same parameters to the X/Y pad, it shows the ring... AND to make it more confusing, all other parameters show separate rings for LFO modulation vs. XY pads... So why show a diamond box that barely serves as an indicator for the modulation range?
My one complaint so far is that the visual cue for modulations assignments is not consistent. They have this stupid “diamond box” for some, while others display a more useful ring.
To make it more confusing as to why they choose this, when you assign those same parameters to the X/Y pad, it shows the ring... AND to make it more confusing, all other parameters show separate rings for LFO modulation vs. XY pads... So why show a diamond box that barely serves as an indicator for the modulation range?
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- KVRAF
- 4218 posts since 15 Sep, 2010
The diamond boxes add random modulation.elxsound wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2019 3:34 pm Nice one Neon Breath!
My one complaint so far is that the visual cue for modulations assignments is not consistent. They have this stupid “diamond box” for some, while others display a more useful ring.
To make it more confusing as to why they choose this, when you assign those same parameters to the X/Y pad, it shows the ring... AND to make it more confusing, all other parameters show separate rings for LFO modulation vs. XY pads... So why show a diamond box that barely serves as an indicator for the modulation range?
https://support.output.com/support/solu ... n-controls
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- KVRAF
- 9813 posts since 18 Aug, 2007 from NYC
Neon Breath wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2019 5:17 pmThe diamond boxes add random modulation.elxsound wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2019 3:34 pm Nice one Neon Breath!
My one complaint so far is that the visual cue for modulations assignments is not consistent. They have this stupid “diamond box” for some, while others display a more useful ring.
To make it more confusing as to why they choose this, when you assign those same parameters to the X/Y pad, it shows the ring... AND to make it more confusing, all other parameters show separate rings for LFO modulation vs. XY pads... So why show a diamond box that barely serves as an indicator for the modulation range?
https://support.output.com/support/solu ... n-controls
Thank you! Makes much more sense!
